


Verge of Eternal

by engagemythrusters



Series: Visions [2]
Category: Doctor Who (2005), Torchwood
Genre: Alternate Universe, Canon Rewrite, Episode: s02e01 Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, M/M, Psychic Abilities, Telekinesis, The Year That Never Was (Doctor Who)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-17
Updated: 2020-09-21
Packaged: 2021-03-08 00:21:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,340
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26516650
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/engagemythrusters/pseuds/engagemythrusters
Summary: "'If you had a word to describe what your Mister Jones could do, what would that word be?'"Ianto Jones was not a normal human. Jack wasn't normal, either. Both of them were sure to draw the attention of a Time Lord or two.
Relationships: Jack Harkness/Ianto Jones
Series: Visions [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1915483
Comments: 26
Kudos: 168





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is from The Year that Never Was, so it is... fairly gory? If that bothers you, don't worry! The rest of the fic _will not_ be gory, so you can skip this chapter and read the rest just fine!

Day two hundred and twenty-eight into his stay on the Valiant went no differently than most of the days before that. The brand and measure of torture, as it usually did, varied from all other days (because god forbid the Master get _bored_ with the hellish nightmare world he’d created), but other than that, it went normally. Sad to say that was the normal now, but it was.

Day two hundred and twenty-nine, though, was a very, _very_ bad day in Jack’s book. And considering that this “very, very bad” day stuck out from the other two hundred and twenty-eight other days of “very, very bad” days… this day was honestly one of the worst days in Jack’s existence. Which also said a lot—Jack didn’t live an otherwise pleasant life.

That morning, at eight on the spot, Jack was stabbed in the chest to “wake up”. Jack’s body, now accustomed to being stuck and bled like a pig, did not die on him, but it did leave him feeling rather miserable, to say the least.

He did manage his normal cheery front when Tish came in to feed him.

“Oats today?” Jack asked.

“Sorry,” Tish said sadly, holding the small pan of mashed swede.

Jack felt bile raise in the back of his throat, but he kept it down. He could palate this. _He could palate this._ He’d managed for this long—he wasn’t about to let that end today.

“It’s never oats,” he said. _“Used_ to be oats.”

“You’re telling me,” she said as she spooned him a bite, “you’d rather go back to stale, raw oats, rather than eat this?”

“Well, if I had a bit of variation…”

Her face twisted into a wry approximation of a smile as she fed him the mouthful. Jack nearly gagged, having not mentally prepared himself for it yet.

“Relax,” she told him. “It’ll go down easier if you just relax.”

“Thanks, mum,” he scoffed when he had managed to swallow.

She rolled her eyes, and they continued the feeding in silence after that. She said a “see you for dinner” before she left, and Jack threw in a half-joked “maybe” (because it was a guessing game whether he got more than one meal a day at this point, and nobody knew for sure when the Master was next going to decide to starve him), but that was all.

One of the worst parts about being up on the Valiant, aside from the torture and all, was the emptiness of it all. It was lonely and boring. Sure, Jack had a guard. But the guard wasn’t allowed to talk to him unless Jack did something wrong, or unless the guard was torturing him. And Jack really had nothing to do, so... lonely and boring.

Actually, when the guard stepped out of his post and turned the boiler room monitor to face Jack, he really started to wish things stayed lonely and boring.

“What’s going on this time?” Jack asked. “Another karaoke event? I’d rather have the firing squad.”

The guard didn’t even look at him. Jack supposed this one might be one of the ones blackmailed into it. Not that those were inherently better than the other guards; anyone who took this position was a monster in Jack’s book, no matter the cause. But he was a tad sympathetic. A tad. Plus, they were usually less inclined to shoot him in the foot for no goddamn reason.

“Fine, be like that,” Jack sighed.

Then he turned his attention to the screen, which fizzed with static for a few moments until it focused. Jack pulled a face when he saw the main deck appear in fuzzy black and white. Jack wasn’t lying; the karaoke the Master did was often unbearable. Half of the time it involved him beheading someone. Or laser-screwdriver the hell out of them.

“Hello, Freak,” the Master said, stepping into view.

“Oh, it’s a personal transmission, is it?” Jack said to the screen.

The Master, who had no way of hearing him, simply went on, “I have a surprise for you!”

Jack sighed. “Goody.”

“And something,” the Master said, shark-like smile plastered across his face, “tells me you’ll just _love_ this one.”

“Something tells me I _won’t_ ,” Jack countered.

And he was right, he discovered as the Master motioned for guards to drag in between them a familiar figure.

He was disgustingly right.

“No!” he shouted.

He tugged on his chains, desperation instantly kicking in as he tried fervently to free himself.

“Say hello!” the Master crowed as the guards dropped the limp form of Ianto Jones down in front of him. “I’m sure our Freak has missed your weird Welsh vowels.”

Jack pulled harder on the cuffs. “Ianto!”

“Come on,” the Master said. “Say hello!”

He toed Ianto, essentially kicking him, and all Ianto did was emit a single quiet sob.

“What have you done to him?” Jack shouted at the screen.

Evidently, the Master wondered the same thing.

“I haven’t even _done_ anything to you yet,” he said to Ianto. He stared down at the prone man for a moment, then grinned up at the screen wickedly. “Is this really what you hire, Freak? Pitiful, wailing messes? Tut tut, it’s no wonder your precious team is all but gone.”

Then he crouched down in front of Ianto. He tilted his head, still leering his foul leer.

“Now, what’s up with you, hm? I don’t think the guards have done much to you, have they, because I strictly ordered them _not to_ …”

That last part was addressed to the two guards who had dragged Ianto in. The two of them quickly looked between themselves and then shook their heads, just as terrified of the Master’s wrath as everyone else on board this floating ship.

“No? Well, then…” The Master turned back to Ianto. “It’s all you. But… why?”

He reached out and grabbed Ianto’s hair, pulling his head up with it.

Jack yanked harder at his chains as Ianto practically screamed.

“Ianto!”

“You know, I do like it when someone is easy to torture,” the Master sighed, “but this is… too easy.”

He let go of Ianto’s hair, and Ianto’s head dropped back down to the ground with an audible _crack_. The Master stood and folded his arms, staring down at Ianto and tapping his foot thoughtfully. Then he turned back, staring through the screen at Jack.

“The last of your team, a snivelling coward. Though I can’t really be surprised, can I? You pal up with those like Martha Jones, hiding behind the lives of innocents as she goes.”

Jack glared furiously at the screen, but he said nothing. Even if the Master couldn’t hear him, it was best if Martha’s plans never escaped Jack’s lips, just in case.

“Right, come on, now,” the Master said, stooping down over Ianto again. “Tell me what’s wrong with you.”

Ianto did nothing.

“I said, _tell me_ ,” the Master snarled.

He shoved Ianto’s shoulder in an attempt to push him onto his back, but Ianto just let out another shout of pain. The Master stood up for a second, peering down curiously at his victim. Jack’s wrists started to bleed as he just kept on pulling at his manacles.

“Interesting,” the Master said.

Jack stilled, horrified by that tone. The Master used it every time he found something new and exciting about Jack midst a vivisection.

“It would seem that it only hurts if I—” the Master suddenly dropped down and pressed his hand on Ianto’s face _“—touch you.”_

A whole agonising minute went on as both Ianto and Jack’s wrists yelled in anguish. The Master’s laughs cut through, punctuating every moment of silence as Ianto paused to inhale.

“What _are_ you?” the Master asked Ianto the moment he drew away.

Ianto’s ragged breath came as the only reply.

“I mean, you’re human, but you’re… more,” the Master continued to muse. “Something’s not quite right with you. Are you a freak, too?”

The Master looked over to the Doctor, who sat in the background, blankly watching the scene in front of him.

“What do you think, oh great Doctor? What sort of freak do we have here?”

As the Doctor had elected near-silence in the Master’s presence since the moment of his oldening, the Master did not receive a response.

“What is it with you people?” the Master sighed, exasperated. “Can none of you answer my questions?”

Jack’s own mind scrambled around. Why was Ianto reacting like this? Ianto was typically more stolid and phlegmatic in situations like these. Jack _knew_ Ianto could take a beating; he’d seen as much. The only time Jack had ever seen anything even remotely similar to this was… back at Canary Wharf…

An idea hit him, and Jack looked between the Doctor and the Master. If dusting a hand in a jar could give Ianto a headache, then what could two whole Time Lords do?

“Well… actually… I think there is someone who could answer… You two?”

The guards who had hauled Ianto in stood to attention.

“Pick him up.”

They did so instantly, and Ianto gave a slight moan as they hoisted him up. The Master observed with a look of supercilious pleasure, then turned once more so that he stared through the screen at Jack.

“See you in a bit!” he crowed.

And then he pointed his laser screwdriver at whatever camera that filmed him, and the transmission shorted out. The screen descended once more into frenzied static. Jack’s head whipped over to the boiler room’s gate, his heart pounding wildly. He had many thoughts racing around his head, though most revolved around the prospect of finally seeing Ianto again, the Master having Ianto in his clutches, and Ianto being hurt.

He shifted his weight on his feet and waited, the pressure of the building tension bearing down on him feeling heavier than ever.

The sound of footsteps came first, and then the Master’s voice carried after.

“Well, Freak,” he called as he strode into view. “What sort of other freaks do you collect?”

He kicked the gate open with a flourish, brushing through with that odious, malevolent smile of his stretched across his face. Jack just stared as the two guards lugged Ianto into the room.

“So,” the Master said. “What is he, then?”

Jack didn’t take his eyes off Ianto. Ianto’s chin hung down on his chest, his ragged hair (god, it had grown since Jack had seen him last) the only viewable part of his head. Jack considered calling out to Ianto to gain his attention, but then figured Ianto didn’t really seem to have the strength to look up. And who knew what sort of punishment the Master would dish out to the pair of them?

“Well?” the Master demanded.

He reached out, twisting his fingers in Ianto’s hair again and yanking upwards. Ianto let out a garbled, pained noise, and Jack tugged once more at the chains on his wrists.

_“What is he?”_

Ianto’s face was a mess. To his credit, he wasn’t sobbing now as he stared at Jack with dead eyes, but the tears still kept tracking down his cheeks. But then the Master pulled harder at Ianto’s hair, and his face screwed up in agony.

“Answer me, Freak!” the Master shouted.

“He’s human!” Jack yelled back, willing to appease the Master so long as Ianto stopped looking like _that_.

The Master rolled his eyes. “Yes, I know that. But why is he doing _this_?”

He shook the hand holding Ianto’s hair, and Ianto groaned through clenched teeth.

Jack looked between the Master and Ianto. That suspicion he had flooded the corners of his mind, but he didn’t know what to do with that information. And he certainly didn’t know what to tell the Master.

“I don’t know.”

The Master scoffed. “Come on. You do.”

“I don’t know!”

His irritation growing, he grasped harder at Ianto’s hair, pulling Ianto’s head fully back.

 _“Why?”_ he yelled.

_“I don’t know!”_

With a look of terrifying fury, the Master finally let go of Ianto. He stalked around behind the guards, then raised his foot, planted it right on Ianto’s back, and struck him forwards. The guards let go of Ianto, and he flew to the grating below, crashing down hard. Jack let out an incensed cry.

“Fine,” the Master snarled. “If that’s how you want to play it…”

He pivoted on a heel and stormed off, leaving whatever threat hanging in the air in front of them. The two guards followed closely behind. All that remained in the boiler room then were Jack, Ianto, the original guard, and a staticky screen.

Jack stared at Ianto, who had curled up into a loose foetal position on the ground. His body quivered slightly with silent sobs. Jack then looked to the boiler room guard; he was now certain this was one of those blackmailed lot, because the guard said and did nothing to either Jack or Ianto and instead kept sending down the hall where the Master and his following had just disappeared. That boded somewhat better for Jack.

“Ianto,” he said quietly. “Ianto.”

Ianto didn’t move, save for his trembling.

Jack shifted his weight and stuck out a foot, touching the very tip of his boot lightly to Ianto’s back. Ianto moved then, uncurling and barely lifting his head off the floor. Jack noted blood on his cheek from where it had collided with the grating as he’d fallen.

“Ianto,” Jack said.

“Jack,” Ianto said, short and sad.

Jack scrounged up a smile for the other man, trying to force some levity into the moment.

“I’m sorry,” Ianto whispered.

“For what?” Jack asked. 

Instead of answering, all Ianto said was, “My head…”

“They’re too much, aren’t they?” Jack asked.

“It _burns_.”

While Jack didn’t really like that he had to keep the toe of his boot on Ianto’s back to touch him, Jack nevertheless kept his boot there. If Jack was a null point for Ianto, he figured it would be best if he remained in contact with Ianto. Maybe, just maybe, his quietness could balance out the overwhelming everything from the two Time Lords. If he could quench the blazing flames left raging in Ianto’s head, he’d do anything to make that happen for Ianto.

Thankfully, Ianto seemed better for the contact; he managed to push himself up a little more, and his eyes seemed less dulled with pain. Jack moved his foot along with Ianto, keeping them linked.

“We’re flying over Cardiff now,” Jack said.

“I know,” Ianto said. “That’s how they found me."

Jack had many things he wanted to say, to ask Ianto (starting with how they caught him), but the moment he opened his mouth, a thunderous sound of footsteps stopped him. Ianto and Jack glanced at each other, Ianto’s eyes wide and Jack’s heart dropping to his stomach.

“Ianto—”

“Don’t,” Ianto said.

Since Jack hadn’t entirely known what he was going to say, he had no idea what Ianto meant, either. But the look in Ianto’s eyes, hidden under the glossy shine of panic, made Jack want to reach out with more than just his goddamn boot and hold Ianto.

The guards ripped Ianto away from Jack, hoisting him up once more. Ianto hissed in pain from either the loss of contact with Jack or the gained touch of the many guards. Jack opened his mouth to shout “let go!” but instead died on the spot as a bullet pierced his skull.

* * *

The clock read 13:03:08 the moment he woke up, so Jack could easily figure he’d been shot a few more times before he could truly revive. A headshot would take fifteen minutes, at most, to reawaken from. And his head hurt more than it should. His brain burned in agony.

… Ianto…

Jack tugged on his manacles, sudden urgency breaking through the otherwise cloudy haze that was coming back to life. He started when his left cuff budged a little. It was… loose.

He supposed all that yanking and pulling he’d done earlier that morning may have loosened them up a bit. Plus, they’d held up his dead weight for quite some time.

Thinking carefully, he tested the chain, trying to gauge how much force it would take to pull free. He kept an eye on the guard (a new one had rotated in, one that Jack despised and Tish feared) while also looking for a possible means of escape.

His big break came when the guard turned to talk to someone through his earpiece. Jack waited for a moment for the conversation to start tapering off, then started pulling hard on his left cuff as the guard signed off. By the time the manacle came loose and the chain clattered to the floor, the guard hadn’t had time to fully regain his composure, and thus didn’t shoot Jack right off the bat. Instead, he had barely turned to see what the fuss was about before Jack swung the chain out, colliding his head and the metal plate that used to attach Jack to the pillar. The guard fell with a loud _thud_ , and Jack paused for a second, waiting to see if anyone had heard that. When nobody came, he chuckled to himself, then leaned forward to root through the guard’s pockets with his free hand. He grabbed the key, unlocked both hands, and then set out on his way after crushing the guard’s earpiece and kicking the bastard’s… well.

Jack had a vague idea where Ianto might be. Well, no—he knew exactly where Ianto would be. Limited space for interrogation on this ship nowadays, and Jack would know. No, the issue was that Jack was generally dead, drugged, or otherwise out of it when they dragged him there. So getting there was… difficult, to say the least.

He had to hide with every turn he took, avoiding guards and caretakers and engineers. Actually, he spotted Clive Jones once. That time, he tried to make himself obvious. Clive gave him a long, solemn look, then pointed off in a direction Jack hadn’t intended on taking. Then he looked down at the floor he was cleaning again. Jack stared at him a moment longer before heading off in the direction Clive had pointed out.

At the end of that hallway was the interrogation room Jack had set out to find. He spotted no guards outside and heard no commotion from inside, so he opened the door and stepped inside.

Two things immediately stuck out to him. One: the Doctor sat in a dark corner, surveying him with a sad, stony expression. Two: Ianto lay out on an examination table, staring at him with dead eyes, his head bleeding profusely.

“Ianto?” Jack asked, and his voice felt so small.

Ianto didn’t respond.

Jack slowly moved closer, his heart beating all wrong in his chest with every new step. When he stood at the side of the table, Ianto didn’t look like he was breathing. Jack’s shaky fingers tried to find a pulse, but he couldn’t. Ianto’s eyes settled on Jack, though, and that was reassurance enough.

“Ianto?” Jack whispered again.

Ianto said nothing. Jack tried not to look at the hole in the side of his head. Instead, he glanced over to the Doctor, watching silently.

“Do something!” Jack demanded.

And the Doctor did something. He shook his head sadly.

In that moment, something in Jacks brain shut off. Whatever drive to save Ianto’s life suddenly became a drive to make sure that Ianto, in his final moments, felt safe and comforted.

He bent over Ianto, turning his head so that he was eye to eye with Ianto. He had to blink fast, so that the tears in his eyes wouldn’t cloud his vision. He reached out and started stroking his fingers gently through the usually-soft hair of Ianto’s head. It was sticky from blood. Jack would think about that later.

“Hey,” he said. “I’m here. You’re okay. You’re going to be fine. Okay?”

Ianto sort of just blinked.

“Were going to get you out of here,” Jack said softly. “And were going to bring you back down to the Hub. Get you back to Myfanwy.”

The faintest smile twitched on Ianto’s lips.

“Yeah, you and Myfanwy,” Jack said, smiling back as best as he could. “We’re going to feed you both all the dark chocolate and coffee you could ever want, okay? Yeah.”

He kissed Ianto’s forehead, then his nose, then his lips.

“It’s going to be okay,” he murmured to Ianto. “Going to be just fine...”

And Jack kept Ianto safe and comfortable and loved until his eyes dimmed and the last traces of life left his body.

Jack’s entire existence felt like a shell as he bent down to kiss Ianto one last time, to close the staring, lifeless eyes.

He stood and looked over to the Doctor.

“Why didn’t you save him?”

It came out as more of a statement than a question, his tone falling flat and empty.

“He was already gone,” the Doctor said, voice full of regret.

 _“What?”_ Jack asked harshly.

“Do you remember,” the Doctor started, and Jack felt like someone punched him in the gut, “what Rose told you about a woman named Gwyneth?”

Jack could only stare at him.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

The Doctor looked either about to explain or sigh, but the door banged open before Jack could figure out which.

“Ah, lovely,” the Master said, grinning madly. “So glad you could make it, Captain.”

Jack clenched his fists (bloody fists—fists covered in Ianto’s blood) together, seething with unmatched hatred. The Master brushed past him, bending down to look at Ianto’s body.

“Never did figure out what he was,” the Master mused. “Pity. Suppose he was certainly a different freak than you, because there’s no way he’s coming back to—”

And Jack managed to wrap his hands around the Master’s throat for a bare second before the Doctor shouted at him and a guard shot him in the chest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All to be revealed...   
> Thank you for reading! Have a lovely day!


	2. Chapter 2

Jack was practically shoved under a shower. He’d tried to be courteous and allow others to shower first, to wash the grime of “The Year” off of them. However, it seemed a unanimous opinion that the actual, physical grime coating Jack took precedence over that metaphorical grime.

“I’m fairly certain the last time you had a bath was when you last drowned,” Tish said.

“Is that the polite way of telling me ‘you stink?’” Jack asked.

_“Yes.”_

He laughed (because _god_ , it felt so easy to laugh now, even if in a few days that lightness would twist and turn sour, leaving him stricken with nightmares of the harshest kind), and then took off to the showers.

After a long, long time, Jack re-emerged, wearing not much. He’d nicked a pairs of both pants and trousers from some guard’s locker, but he didn’t have anything else to wear other than that. The clothes he’d worn for the past year were even more disgusting than Jack himself had been. Jack elected to burn those in a fire somewhere. But, for now, he didn’t have a shirt.

“Jack, put clothes on,” Martha chided when he walked out onto the main deck.

“What, you don’t like it?” Jack asked, displaying his body.

She grinned and rolled her eyes. “Just put a shirt on.”

“Alright, fine,” Jack said. “Since you asked so nicely.”

He turned and continued on his search.

The Master had kept a few “trophies” lying around. Showcased all the things he’d conquered in his year-long reign as evil tyrant of the Earth. Jack figured there’s be a few museums and palaces and such scrambling around right now, trying to find quite a number of highly important baubles. He half fancied that thought for a moment, finding it somewhat amusing. Then he moved on, still searching for that trophy that belonged to him.

When he found it, he instantly slung it over his shoulders. Something inside his chest clicked, and suddenly that elated feeling of freedom flushed away. A strong urge to find the farthest, quietest, loneliest corner overcame him, but he pushed it down. No time for that yet.

Starting to feel wrong in the stolen clothes of a guard who had probably shot him at least once, Jack backtracked. He wandered around for a bit until he found the way to the engine room, and then headed off in that direction.

The TARDIS still sat in the spot he’d left her, though there seemed to be something almost… _better_ about her now. She hadn’t looked this blue the last time he’d seen her as he’d destroyed the paradox. She’d healed, he supposed.

He wished it were that easy for non-TARDIS beings, too.

The halls of the TARDIS felt like home. But, instead of it feeling like a grand homecoming, it felt like wading through half-remembered memories, trying to place “then” and “now” together and failing spectacularly. It didn’t feel like _home_ home anymore. Just one he’d yearned for, but no longer belonged in.

His room still sat where he’d left it. Jack stared at the bed for a long moment before turning to the wardrobe. That wasn’t the same, Jack realised as he opened it. It now held his now normal outfits, instead of the old, disgustingly mid-2000's ensembles he used to adorn. button-ups, ranging from the palest shades to a blue deeper than the ocean. Jack selected one of the lighter hues, grabbed a belt, some braces, and found new pants and trousers. He quickly tore off his current outfit and, in his haste, practically shoved himself into the new one.

No longer feeling inhuman, Jack stuck his hands in his coat pockets, closed his eyes, and took a moment to simply _breathe_.

Freedom.

What the hell was he supposed to do with that? He had no idea. He supposed he’d have to ask Ianto.

His eyes snapped back open.

Ianto.

Jack tore out of his room in an instant, striding briskly down the halls of the TARDIS.

He was so keen on leaving that he almost didn’t notice the Doctor standing next to the TARDIS’s console. He only stopped when the Doctor called his name shortly.

Jack whirled around.

“My team,” he said.

“Alive,” the Doctor said, turning towards the console and pressing a few buttons. “Everything reset.”

“Even…”

Even Ianto, who had died on board the Valiant?

“Yes, even your Mister Jones.”

“But—”

“Tossed overboard.”

Jack shut his eyes for a second and tried not to picture that. When he opened his eyes again, the Doctor was studying him.

“Your Mister Jones…” he murmured.

“What about him?” Jack asked, worry still simmering in his chest.

“He’s quite the fascinating man.”

Jack frowned. “And?”

“If you had a word to describe what your Mister Jones could do, what would that word be?”

Jack stared at the Doctor for a second, flabbergasted.

“What?” he settled on eventually.

“One word,” the Doctor reiterated. “Any, really. Just curious.”

After a little while longer of just staring, Jack said, “Torchwood London called it ‘psychic powers.’”

“Aah, but that’s not it, is it?” The Doctor leaned over the console and flipped a switch. “That’s not even _close_.”

“What are you saying?” Jack asked.

“What I’m saying,” the Doctor said, looking back to Jack, “is that you and I both know it’s more than that. I’ve seen psychism before, Jack. And I’ve seen this, too. They aren’t the same. This is… this is something specific to him and him alone.”

“Wait, you’ve seen this before?”

“Oh, yes. And that’s why the Master couldn’t figure it out. He’d never seen it before.”

“But _you_ can figure it out?”

“I already have.” When Jack shot him a look, and he continued, “I told you before, remember? Gwyneth.”

“Gwyneth,” Jack stated, prompting more.

“I know Rose told you about her,” the Doctor said. “Before our night in Cardiff.”

“She said it wasn’t her first time in Cardiff with you…” Jack recalled.

“And it wasn’t.”

Then the Doctor started off on a somewhat complex story about ghost-like apparitions, Charles Dickens, and a peculiar servant named Gwyneth. Jack listened intently, starting to remember bits and pieces of Rose’s more rambled version of this tale.

“So…” Jack said slowly when the Doctor had finished. “What you’re saying is…”

“What I’m saying is, Ianto Jones falls under the same category of interesting as Gwyneth did,” the Doctor said.

Jack took some time to process this.

“The Rift…”

“The Rift fuels it,” the Doctor said. “He and the Rift are connected.”

“But he’s human,” Jack said, grasping for understanding.

“Definitely. No question about it,” the Doctor said. “Human as human can get.”

“Then… why him?”

The Doctor shrugged. “Close proximity. Born right under it. I assume the Rift picks up someone every new generation. And I’d say it’s getting stronger, too.”

Jack sent him a questioning frown.

“Well,” the Doctor said, “Gwyneth couldn’t sense me the way he could.”

“You hurt him,” Jack said.

“Not surprising. Time Lords are… a lot. Imagine that. Not only does he get all of that information we’ve collected over hundreds of years, but the added burden of the Untempered Schism?” The Doctor let out an exhale. “I can’t even imagine how that reads to others.”

“The Master was worse,” Jack said, mostly to himself. “He was bad, at Canary Wharf, and with your hand, but…”

“The Master had a lot more chaos up there, I suppose. And there were two of us. It’s no wonder he was the way he was. One would enough to floor someone with abilities to his exact extent and control. Two must’ve been hell.”

“Sure looked like it,” Jack muttered. Then he frowned. “Control… he doesn’t have much. Can he learn some?”

“I don’t think so, no,” the Doctor said. “Gwyneth couldn’t control what little she had, either. I think that with the evolving powers, comes control. Somewhere down along the line, sometime, someday, there will be someone with complete control and full realisation of whatever the Rift has to give. But, until then… Ianto Jones drew the short straw: he’s got to deal with a lot, and he has no way of controlling it.”

Jack considered that for a short while. Ianto had already given up on looking for control, so Jack supposed this wasn’t entirely devastating, but… it was a bit of a let-down, he did have to admit. Though news of the reason behind Ianto’s powers could be welcoming.

“Wait,” Jack said.

The Doctor’s eyebrows raised.

“At the end… you said he was already dead.”

“He was,” the Doctor said.

“Is that—”

“New? No. Gwyneth did that, too. Subsisted on the Rift just long enough for us to escape before she blew the place down.”

“But… how?”

“Not sure,” the Doctor admitted. “That is one I can’t figure out yet. Though I am brilliant; I’ll get it eventually.”

“We were floating over Britain when he died,” Jack said, ignoring the Doctor.

“Exactly. Right over the Cardiff. Easiest for him to drain from the Rift.”

Jack wasn’t sure how much he liked Ianto “draining from the Rift,” but this was undeniably information to consider at a later date.

“What about telekinesis?” Jack asked. “Was Gwyneth telekinetic, too?”

The Doctor’s brows knit together. “No, that’d certainly be new…”

“He said it only happens when he’s a good mood.”

The Doctor kept scowling, evidently taking this in.

“That’s either an anomaly, or something I did not predict,” the Doctor said. “Though I suppose if he could, theoretically, pull open the Rift… a part of space and time… he could maybe bend a few things outside of that, too.”

“You’re saying he’s bending space?” Jack asked.

“Minorly,” the Doctor said. “Possibly. Maybe. Don’t think to hard about it—it’s just a hypothesis.”

“Alright,” Jack said slowly, frowning.

“Needless to say… you’ve found yourself quite the interesting employee, Jack,” the Doctor said. “Keep an eye on that one.”

Then he gave Jack a meaningful look, and Jack got the impression he was being dismissed. After a final searching glance at the Doctor, Jack turned and left, trying to figure out what he was supposed to do now. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaaand I finally get around to explaining Ianto's powers.  
> Thank you for reading! Have a great day!


	3. Chapter 3

After Ianto had… after, Jack had lost all cause. Nothing tethered him anymore. Not until, two weeks later, Tish started asking him questions about Ianto. At first, Jack had ignored her, the pain still too fresh. But she kept asking, and slowly he started giving answers. And then Francine joined in, the few times it was her turn to deal with Jack. Between the two of them, they’d even convinced him to start looking forward to the future. Tish had first suggested the date, but it was Francine who had really given him the backbone to start planning one.

So, that was why, at the most inopportune time to ask Ianto out on a date, Jack asked Ianto out on a date.

Ianto had rebuffed Jack’s initial roundabout attempt at flirting.

“Office romances…” Jack said. “Photocopying your butt… Well, maybe not your butt. Although, as we’re here, why don’t we photo—”

“The Rift,” Ianto said, cutting over him, “was active at these coordinates approximately two hundred feet above ground. That means this floor… or the roof.”

His hands had gone to his hips, but they slipped away as he walked around to the next desk and started looking for the cylindrical cannister under more leaves of paper.

Jack frowned. He knew there would be more consequences than just an unsure “are you going back to him?” Jack had sworn he had come back for Ianto. For the team. But that clearly wasn’t enough, and he should have caught onto that faster, in hindsight.

He’d kissed Ianto like _that_ , in front of the whole team, and then swanned off to find the Doctor. He’d promised so much in that kiss, but instead of keeping his word, he had left. And it wasn’t good enough to belatedly return to that promise.

“How are you, Ianto?” Jack asked.

“All the better for having you back, sir,” Ianto said.

But he had said it as he’d turned away for another desk, so the sincerity was… improbable, at best.

“Can we maybe drop the sir, now?” The plea may have escaped into Jack’s tone. “I mean, while I was away, I—I was thinking… maybe we could… you know, when this is all done…”

God, this was not coming out the way he’d expected.

He took a breath and finished, “Dinner… a movie…”

Ianto turned back, hands back on his hips and a bemused expression on his face.

“What?” he asked.

Jack should’ve figured those were social cues likely never exposed to Ianto.

“Ianto, I’m asking you out on a date,” he said.

“On… a date,” Ianto repeated.

“Interested?” 

Ianto stared at Jack for a second, then scoffed awkwardly.

“Well… as… long as it’s not in an office,” he said, clearly flustered. “Some fetishes should be kept to yourself.”

Jack raised his eyebrows. He’d like to know where Ianto learned about fetishes, but he suspected the answer was either Owen or absorbing the information, so he figured it was best left unasked. He instead watched as Ianto started rifling through papers and binders again.

“Looks like we're gonna have to go through every drawer, bin, and plant pot,” Jack said, hoping maybe Ianto would get the hint and start looking somewhere that would actually hide an object the size of a fist.

“Right, okay,” Ianto said. He stood from where he’d started to search the drawers and looked at Jack. “I’ll do this floor. Don’t want you getting overexcited…”

Jack internally cringed on both of their behalves.

“And you take the roof,” Ianto finished. “You’re good on rooves.”

Gathering he wasn’t wanted, Jack started to leave without another word, pushing through the doors. He only paused when Ianto called his name.

“Why are we helping him?”

Him. “John Hart.” God, the universe really threw a spanner in the works when it decided now would be a good time to open _that_ particular can of worms again. It started to feel like Jack just couldn’t catch a break.

“He’s a reminder of my past,” Jack told Ianto. “I want him gone.”

He made to leave again, but he got no further than placing his hand on the door before he looked back to Ianto.

“By the way… was that a yes?”

“Yes,” Ianto responded automatically. “Yes…”

The still-flustered response made Jack laugh to himself. That, and the elated feeling that now flooded his chest. He pushed out of the room, continuing to smile, and headed for the roof.

Things did not unfold as straightforwardly as Jack had naïvely hoped. Really, he had no idea why he was so willing to trust John this time around. That wasn’t even his _name_. Though Gwen did clip him pretty good, so Jack supposed the evening wasn’t without its highlights in that area. He wasn’t sure what to make of Ianto’s consideration of an orgy, though.

In the end, they had to spend the night at a hotel to escape their present counterparts. Jack hated this sort of accidental time-travel. The rest didn’t seem to mind, because they were spending a night in luxury at no expense of their own; Torchwood would wind up paying for this one. Well, Gwen minded a little, because she wanted to call Rhys and could not.

“He won’t know it’s me,” she said to Jack. “Well, he’ll know it’s _me_ , but he won’t know I’m me from six hours in the future.”

“You could slip up,” Jack said.

She threw him an annoyed look. “I’ve been keeping stuff from Rhys without slipping up for well over half a year now.”

“Don’t call him,” Jack ordered.

She looked ready to continue arguing, but Owen butted in.

“There’s a bar,” he said. “That better be paid for by you, too. You owe me that much.”

“You’ve just been _shot_ ,” Jack said.

“Yeah, well, what a great way to take my mind off of being shot by your ex.” Owen gave him a pointed look.

Jack sighed. “You do realise _I_ don’t pay for this—Torchwood does.”

“The Crown does, actually,” Jack heard Ianto muter from somewhere behind them.

“I don’t give a shit who pays, just as long as it isn’t me,” Owen said. “Anyone else?”

Jack glanced at the other team members. Toshiko looked like she was considering a drink herself, Gwen appeared a little less displeased than a moment before, and Ianto had an inscrutable expression that Jack couldn’t read.

“Right. I’m going,” Owen said, and he took off.

Toshiko and Gwen spared each other a quick look, then began to follow Owen toward the bar. Ianto and Jack stood alone for a moment.

“Suppose we should follow,” Jack said.

“Suppose,” Ianto repeated softly.

Gwen and Toshiko, surprisingly, went harder on the drinks. Neither drank in excess, only verging on tipsy, but it was enough for the both of them to settle in their emotions. Actually, when Jack and Ianto steered them to their rooms, they had their goes at Jack: Gwen wanted to shout at him for leaving and Toshiko just wanted answers.

“Don’t call Rhys,” Jack told Gwen, stealing her mobile for the night as she huddled herself in her blankets on her bed.

“At least he knows I’m coming back,” she said.

Jack figured that was only a portion of what he deserved, so he took it.

Ianto did not emerge from Toshiko’s room when Jack left Gwen for the night. He stood in the hall by Tosh’s door for a bit, figuring he’d wait, but hushed voices emitting from the room told him that waiting would be futile. He couldn’t hear what they were saying, either, so snooping was also pointless. He left for the bar and Owen.

“You still sure this was a good idea?” Jack asked Owen, taking the seat beside the other man.

“I have,” Owen said after swallowing his drink, “cleaned and wrapped the wound to the best of my abilities, taken some painkillers, and watched Gwen punch the bastard who shot me. I’m fine.”

“Should you be drinking with the painkillers?”

“Nonaddictive alien formula I made, keep up.”

“I thought that was for hangovers,” Jack said.

“Yeah, well, if I keep this up, it certainly will be tomorrow.” Owen took another of his drink.

Jack frowned at him for a second, then picked up his own abandoned glass of water.

“So,” he said. “You feeling in the mood to yell at me, too?”

“Who yelled?” Owen asked. “Gwen?”

“She wasn’t pleased.”

“Of course she wasn’t,” he scoffed. “You know what things were like when you were gone?”

Jack opened his mouth, though he hadn’t formulated anything to say by the time Owen cut over him.

“It was a shitshow,” he said. “We had no idea what we were doing. Ianto was a miserable sod, Tosh didn’t say a word when she didn’t have to, Gwen got snippy, and I was a right twat. And you were just… gone. Where the hell did you go, Jack?”

Jack studied Owen briefly before saying, “To the end of the universe and back.”

Owen sighed. “Right.”

“I’m serious.”

“I’m sure you are,” Owen said. “Just not sure why you would go to the end of the bloody universe if you didn’t even get what you needed.”

Jack wanted to tell him it wasn’t like that, but that came dangerously close to explaining what had happened, and he wasn’t touching that with a ten foot pole. The more he had to explain, the more he had to think. Thinking wasn’t what he wanted to do right now.

“Oh, there’s Tea Boy,” Owen said.

Ianto, looking unamused, sat down with them. Jack passed Ianto back his water.

“You two are bloody awful to drink with,” Owen said.

“Stop drinking, then,” Ianto suggested.

“Over my dead body.”

Ianto rolled his eyes and Owen finished off his drink.

“Right, the two of you can sit here and drink your waters and send each other googly eyes,” he said, “but I’m going to go up to my room and drink more.”

Jack threw him a questioning look (googly eyes?), but Owen just got up and left without another word. Ianto frowned after him, then at Jack.

“So,” Jack said.

Ianto raised an eyebrow. “So.”

“Do anything fun while I was gone?”

Ianto’s frown deepened, and he glanced down at his glass. Jack cleared his throat, regretting the joke, and took a drink of his own water.

They sat in silence for a while. Ianto fiddled with his glass of water. Jack watched him, noting the slight tension in his shoulders. He wondered, briefly, if Ianto had learned to eliminate that same tension when he used a gun yet.

Jack studied Ianto’s face, too, taking in the way the lights fell across it, how shadows danced under his furrowed brows and in the depths of his eyes. The pinnacle of beauty, Jack thought, formed by gentle softness opposing stark sharpness on Ianto’s face. He’d certainly come a long way from the gaunt, boyish kid Jack had pulled from the wreckage of Torchwood London.

Hard to imagine that the last time Jack had seen him, he’d been covered in his own blood.

Jack closed his eyes. He could still feel the blood on his hands. How sticky it had been when he’d run his hands through Ianto’s hair.

“Jack?”

Blinking his eyes open, Jack looked to Ianto, who was frowning softly at him.

“Are you alright?” he asked.

“Fine,” Jack said.

Ianto gave him a look steeped in subtle disbelief. Jack glanced down at the swirling ice in his glass. He considered the truth, briefly. If anyone could help him sort out the confusing, swirling mess in his head right now, it would be Ianto. Perhaps Toshiko, because she knew what it was like, too, but… Ianto knew it best.

However, when he opened his mouth to say something, what came out instead was, “It’s the Rift.”

Ianto frowned. “What?”

“The Rift,” Jack repeated. “That’s why you know everything.”

For what felt like eternity, Ianto sat absolutely still and stared at Jack blankly. Jack held that stare, waiting for a sign to continue.

“What do you mean?” Ianto eventually murmured.

Jack leant forward in his seat, keeping his gaze locked with Ianto’s. “When I was… away…”

Ianto didn’t blink at the slight fumble.

“I talked to someone,” Jack finished.

“Someone,” Ianto repeated impassively.

Jack raised an eyebrow and Ianto said, “ah.” No point in saying the name and causing Ianto grief if Jack had a way around it. When Jack had first returned to the Hub, the team had cornered him to demand where he’d gone, and the left side of Ianto’s face seemed to involuntarily spasm any time someone alluded to the Doctor. Even now, Ianto’s eye twitched minutely, so it wasn’t perfect, but at least it was _better_.

“But you’re connected,” Jack went on. “You and the Rift.”

“How?”

“I don’t know,” Jack said.

“Helpful,” Ianto said dryly.

“It picks someone new every generation. Someone born right under it,” Jack said. “In 1869, it was a woman called Gwyneth. And it went through time and now…”

“It’s me,” Ianto surmised.

“It’s you,” Jack confirmed.

“So… what, am I its host?” Ianto asked.

“More like a tether, I’d say,” Jack said.

“But in any case, I’m connected with it.”

Jack nodded.

Ianto’s eyes drifted off somewhere to the left of Jack as he seemed to consider all of this.

“Alright,” he said when he looked back to Jack.

Jack frowned. “Alright?”

“Alright,” Ianto repeated softly.

Jack’s confusion didn’t leave, though the sublte acceptance and finality of Ianto’s tone prevented him from pursuing it further. Perhaps Ianto knew the rest already, or could piece it together himself. Or maybe this was all he wanted to know. In the end, it was up to him, so Jack had nothing more to say.

Ianto took a drink of water, and Jack of his own, busying their mouths with something so they didn’t have to pretend they knew what to say. Their glasses returned to the table with a dull _clink… clink_ , one after the other, and they were forced to think of something to say.

Ianto got there first.

“He’ll be back.”

“Who?” Jack asked. “Owen?”

“‘John Hart,’” Ianto said, and Jack could almost feel the implied quotes. How much of John’s life resided inside that head now? How much of it was things Jack had never known?

Jack shoved those thoughts aside. Not important now. “Are you sure?”

Ianto’s eyebrows skyrocketed, and Jack realised his mistake belatedly. Hadn’t he _just_ been thinking about this stuff?

“Just double-checking,” Jack muttered, taking another sip of water.

Ianto rolled his eyes, and something eased in Jack’s chest. That was the Ianto that Jack new. That was the Ianto that had flourished in front of his eyes. Jack smiled to himself, hidden by the lip of his glass.

“Were you really considering his offer?”

Ianto threw him a quizzical look, which quickly eased into recognition. And then a smirk.

“Well,” he said. “It has been a while.”

“If you’re interested,” Jack said, grinning, “I’ve still got that hotel room.”

For a moment, recollection glinted in Ianto’s eyes, but it died out. He glanced between his glass, the exit, and then Jack, appearing uncertain.

“Offer for a date still stands,” Jack said. “But I figured… while we have the night off…”

And nights off didn’t happen often.

Ianto thought on it more, repeating the glances between the glass, the exit, and Jack. Then he inhaled shortly and silently, looked Jack in the eyes, and the corner of his mouth twitched up.

“Lots of things you can do in a hotel room,” he said.

“I can think of a few,” Jack said, grinning again. “See you there in ten?”

And because Ianto was Ianto, he pulled out his ever-present stopwatch.

“Ten minutes,” he said, clicking the button down, “and counting.”

Jack downed the last of his water and stood, making to go. Ianto caught the sleeve of his coat before he could get far.

“Thank you,” Ianto said, and Jack couldn’t guess what for. But he nodded kindly, and Ianto released him.

After one last long look at the other man, Jack left the bar, wandering down the halls of the hotel. Nothing shone from underneath Gwen and Tosh’s doors, though light poured out of the cracks of Owen’s. Jack would’ve checked in, but he figured Owen did actually want that drink alone. He went to his own room then. He took a quick peek around, gaining his bearings, and then went to go eye the bed in eagerness.

Minutes later, a knock came from the door. Jack strode over and opened it in an instant. Lo and behold, there stood Ianto, clicking the button of his stopwatch down.

“Ten minutes?” Jack asked.

Ianto’s lips curled upwards, lights playing in his eyes. Jack grinned back and stepped aside, letting Ianto come in. He then closed and locked the door and followed Ianto into the room, the hope in his chest blossoming.

“How’s Myfanwy?” Jack asked.

Ianto, who had begun tugging off his tie, frowned at him. “What?”

“When’s the last time you sat with her?”

“Two days ago,” Ianto said dryly. “We both cursed your name and spat in your shoes.”

Jack chuckled and stepped forward, placing a hand to Ianto’s cheek. Ianto's piercing blue gaze locked onto his and held him captive for a moment. 

“I missed you,” Jack murmured. “Really.”

Then he kissed Ianto, and by some blessing of the universe, Ianto kissed him back, just as passionately and eagerly.

Maybe it would take a while for things to get back to how they should be, but at least Ianto, ever a constant and a comfort, would be there with him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's all for now, but the next installment will be up in a week or so!  
> Thank you for reading and have an amazing day!


End file.
